


That's Just How Siblings Are

by cloakoflevitation



Series: A Brother Is... [1]
Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders Needs a Hug, Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders Needs a Hug, Feelings, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, No Beta – We Fall Like Crowley, No Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-05
Updated: 2020-05-06
Packaged: 2021-01-23 10:40:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21318829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cloakoflevitation/pseuds/cloakoflevitation
Summary: We all know that trope that's like 'oh no I'm injured and I didn't know where else to go so here I am on my enemy's doorstep' right? It's basically that with Roman and Remus, with Roman being the injured one.Also, Virgil is still a dark side in this one, and the light sides don't really know much about the dark sides. Virgil and Deceit show up briefly, but it's like 80% about Roman and Remus.5/6/2020 EDIT: New chapter - Remus is hurt this time. Now also featuring Patton and Logan! Also: spoilers (re: a name) for the POF:SVSR episode!!***Warnings: Swearing.Blood.Needles. Poor baby boy gets stitches. I had to hurt him because that's the whole premise. It's not terribly graphic (I don't think?) but like,,, there is blood y'all. Stay safe |-/
Series: A Brother Is... [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1728859
Comments: 98
Kudos: 419





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jo_Castle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jo_Castle/gifts), [ShadowsWings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShadowsWings/gifts), [9Teyya_Winterbound6](https://archiveofourown.org/users/9Teyya_Winterbound6/gifts), [neoncity](https://archiveofourown.org/users/neoncity/gifts), [Piqued_Penguin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Piqued_Penguin/gifts).
**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. So many kind-hearted individuals left the sweetest comments on one of my other sanders sides fics, [Who We Are and Who We Were](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20222164), and please know I reread and treasure all of them.
> 
> 2\. If this fic was gifted to you: y'all left me several really encouraging comments as I uploaded chapters of the above fic. Y'all hold a special place in my heart. Like seriously. You're gems. I appreciate the h*ck outta you. I hope you like this one! <3

This had to be one of the worst ideas he’d ever had, but there was no other option. None that he was willing to take, anyways.

“You better have brought back my cheese grater!”

Roman winced, leaning his weight more on his right leg while he used a hand to pound on the door again. He had no idea who had taken Remus’s cheese grater or for what purpose, but he was certain he didn’t want to know. And why did Remus even have one in the first place?

But he was all too aware most questions were better left unasked when it came to his brother.

“Have you no -,” the door was flung open to reveal Remus, “…patience. Hmmm.” Remus looked him up and down, his gaze lingering on Roman’s left leg. “Why hello, _ Roman. _ I wasn’t expecting you.”

Roman stumbled past him into the room, sitting on the edge of Remus’s bed in a way that was more collapsing than sitting. Clothes and a lampshade and what looked to be the entire contents of Remus’s desk (or perhaps the contents of his room) were piled on top of his sheets (if he even had any sheets on the bed, underneath everything) but Roman was too exhausted to care.

Remus closed the door, slowly walking across the room, all the while wearing a Cheshire grin. “What brings you here, _ brother mine?” _

The way his eyes traced Roman’s body made him wholly uncomfortable. It felt like a twisted game of cat and mouse, with Remus as the predator and Roman as the prey. 

Not for the first time, Roman doubted his decision to come.

Remus raised his eyebrows, still grinning like a feral madman. “Not injured, are you?” he asked, and Roman could tell he already knew the answer.

_ Odin’s eyepatch. _ He was really starting to wish he had just gone back to his own room and suffered alone.

Roman grit his teeth and forced himself to respond. He had come for a reason, after all, and it wouldn’t help him any if he antagonized Remus. “Dragon Witch. In the Imagination. With claws.” 

Remus snapped his fingers and a first aid kit appeared on his desk. He tilted his head, giving Roman a searching look. “You must be truly desperate to come to me for help.”

Roman shot him an unimpressed look and touched his pants with a finger, and in the blink of an eye his pants had turned into rather short shorts, revealing several gashes above his knee on his left leg.

“You robbed me of an opportunity to tell you to drop your pants,” Remus pouted, reaching out a hand as if to trace the claw marks.

Roman narrowed his eyes and pointed at the first aid kit. “Just fix me up so I can leave.”

“Tetchy, are we?”

“It’s the blood loss,” he snapped back. “It does things to a person’s mood.” Roman was really starting to hate how happy the situation seemed to make Remus.

But Remus only chuckled, turning away to rifle through the bandages and medical supplies. “Bet it’ll be a bitch to wash the blood out of your pants.” He held up gauze and scissors and some tape. Roman pointed to a tube of antibiotic ointment, which Remus grabbed with a roll of his eyes.

“Nah, I’m pretty good at getting it out now.”

Remus froze for a second. “This happens a lot?”

Roman shrugged, taking the ointment. “Often enough.” He smeared it across the gashes, wincing as he did. It was better than getting an infection, though.

“Hold this,” Remus instructed, in a surprisingly subdued voice. He had cut off three pieces of tape and reached over to stick them on the back of Roman’s hand. Then he wrapped the gauze, one loop at a time, around Roman’s leg. “Why are you here?” He didn’t meet Roman’s eyes.

“I didn’t want to worry Patton and Logan.”

Remus dropped the roll of gauze and swore. It unrolled some, but he picked it up and wrapped Roman’s leg once more, seemingly unbothered by the fact that he was now holding less of a roll and more of a pile of fabric. “But you don’t mind worrying me, I see.”

Roman laughed. “Oh yeah, like you worry about me.”

Remus didn’t say anything. He didn’t look up from Roman’s leg. He carefully pulled the pieces of tape stuck to Roman’s hand and secured the bandages.

Roman couldn’t help but feel like he had said something wrong. It seemed he had made some kind of misstep, but he couldn’t figure out for the life of him what had irritated Remus.

Remus waved a hand and Roman’s shorts changed back into pants, albeit a bit looser than normal. The fabric didn’t pull on his gashes, due to the bandages. The blood, however, stood out starkly against the white fabric.

“Oh. Thanks.” Roman blinked a bit owlishly at Remus, not sure what to make of his sudden dour mood and surprisingly helpful gesture.

There was something guarded in Remus’s eyes, and Roman might have called his expression disappointed. 

Remus raised a hand, fingers touching in a way that suggested he was about to snap. “Don’t thank me. And don’t come back.” When he snapped, the world dipped sideways for the briefest second, and then Roman found himself in his own room.

*

Five weeks later Roman was outside Remus’s room again, this time with scratches down his back. There were only four, but they hurt something horrible. Roman couldn’t really see them no matter how he twisted (he was never doing that again because the twisting had nearly made him black out from the pain) but he was sure they were deep.

Remus walked up from the hallway behind him, and if Roman wasn’t so tired, he would have felt foolish for spending so long knocking on the door to an empty room.

“What the fuck?” Remus hissed, looking down the hall over his shoulder like he was worried one of the other dark sides might appear. “What are you doing here?”

Roman attempted to smile, but it ended up being more of a grimace than anything else. “Need your help.”

Remus looked like he was going to argue, but changed his mind at the last second. He flung the door open, pushing Roman inside. “Alright, alright, get in.”

His back _ burned _ where Remus touched it, and he jerked away, whimpering.

Remus looked down at his hand, eyes wide, as he slowly rubbed the ends of his fingers together, feeling the blood on them. _ “Fucking hell, _ Roman,” he swore under his breath.

The door slammed shut behind them on its own. The bedspread lifted up off the bed and prompted dumped all its contents onto the ground before settling back flat over the bed.

Remus made a little circular motion in the air with one of his fingers and Roman’s clothing from his waist up vanished. “Bed. Now.” Remus’s voice was stern, but the look of absolute horror on his face twisted up Roman’s insides. Remus seemed… concerned. It made Roman feel… guilty.

He crawled onto the bed carefully, trying his best not to move in any way that pulled at the slices running across his shoulder blades and down his spine. He laid on his stomach, head turned to the side to watch Remus.

Remus had summoned a first aid kit, but he was currently inspecting Roman’s back.

“Dragon Witch?”

“Dragon Witch,” Roman confirmed.

“You should be more careful.” The words startled Roman, particularly the way they were said. Not as a jeer or a jab, but almost… almost as a scolding. As a request. _ Please be more careful. _ He had no idea what to make of that.

Remus stood watching him, eyes flicking back and forth minutely, as if following the wounds. He didn’t say anything more. He didn’t make any moves to touch him or to grab anything from the first aid kit.

Roman waited.

After a minute, Remus’s fingers started to tap against the sides of his own legs, smearing blood on his pants, where his hand had touched Roman’s back.

“…Remus?”

Abruptly turning towards the first aid kit, Remus began to parse through its contents. He murmured something that vaguely sounded like an apology. “It’s the blood. Makes me think things. Lots of thoughts. Lots of thinking.” He raised a hand to tap his temple, smearing the blood that was still on his fingers across his face in the process. It didn’t seem to bother him. In fact, he didn’t even seem to notice.

It suddenly dawned on Roman what his presence was doing to Remus. It certainly couldn’t be helping him to be confronted with open wounds and blood - very good sources for horrible, twisted, intrusive fantasies to spring from.

He started to push up on his forearms, saying, “I can go -”

Remus spun around, giving him a death glare. _ “Don’t.” _ When he was satisfied Roman wasn’t moving, he held up a needle between his thumb and forefinger. He was smiling but it was jagged and cracked and there was fear in his eyes. “You need stitches.”

_ Oh Remus. _ “Alright,” Roman said softly, watching Remus closely as he turned back to the first aid kit. “Thank you.”

Remus went still for a second at the words, but then continued to pull items out. He was silent as he gathered them. Grimly, he moved over to the bed, setting down the medical supplies he had collected next to Roman’s leg. He warned, “This is going to hurt.”

Roman squeezed his eyes shut, turning his head so his other cheek rested against the bed. He didn’t want to see anything Remus was doing or what he picked up. “I know.”

After a few moments that felt more like centuries, he felt Remus’s fingers on his shoulder blade and then the sting of the needle. He sucked in a breath and tried to breathe through the pain.

“Tell me,” Remus’s voice floated in through the torture, “Why come to me?”

“Morality worries. Logic _ah…” _ He let out a hiss, squeezing his hands into fists, digging his nails into his palms. “Logic gets frustrated. He…” A pause for agony. “He knows we’re not physical and...” Another pause for agony. “He can heal himself.”

“You know we’re not physical.” Roman could hear the unasked question. _ Why don’t you heal yourself? _

“S’not the same.” He winced and tried his best not to flinch at _ whatever _ Remus was currently doing. “Do you heal yourself?”

“No. Can’t.” He heard Remus sigh. “I asked Deceit about it once, actually. He seems to think the whole willful suspension of disbelief shit is what makes the wounds real for me. For us.” There was a pause, and then Remus started talking faster, almost sounding embarrassed. “Deceit gets to opt out, like Logic. Something about lying to himself about his injuries. Anxiety’s stuck with his though, like me. But he doesn’t get hurt much. He’s,” Remus chuckled, like they were sharing some kind of inside joke, “He’s pretty careful.”

Remus continued to work in silence, leaving Roman to his thoughts. He drifted in and out of reality, delirious with exhaustion but pulled from the brink of unconsciousness by sharp, short bursts of torment that reminded him what Remus was doing to his back.

At some point, he must have fallen asleep because when he woke, the room was dim. A weird orangish glow came from between the blinds on the window and a very faint light streamed in from the doorway that he thought led to Remus’s closet.

Slowly, he sat up, wincing when he could feel the stitches pull. He still didn’t have a shirt on, but he didn’t want to risk it rubbing against his back. Remus was nowhere in sight.

He wondered how long he had been out.

He got to his feet, gingerly, and tentatively called, “Remus? I’m leaving now.”

Appearing from the (closet?) doorway, Remus thrust something cold and weighty into Roman’s hands.

Roman held it away from his body, eyeing it suspiciously.

“It’s chainmail,” Remus muttered, not meeting Roman’s gaze. “Just watch your back, okay?” After a second, the double meaning seemed to register, and Remus broke into a wide grin. “Ha,” he barked out something that only somewhat resembled laughter. “Get it? Watch your _ back?” _

Carefully ignoring the way his heart squeezed at the thought that Remus gave him chainmail, that Remus wanted to protect him, that Remus _ openly cared, _ he ducked his head and mumbled, “Yeah, I get it.”

Remus stood there, looking at him, with a weird hesitant look that was entirely out of place on him. He started to say something, and Roman was suddenly struck by the thought that they were about to have some kind of _ moment. _ Panicking, he took a step back, shoving words out of his mouth so Remus couldn’t say anything.

“Thanks. And uh, you can keep my clothes. You’ll probably have more use for them now than I will.”

The idea of Roman’s bloody, shredded jacket brightened Remus’s expression, and Roman promptly sank out.

*

There was a loud thunk against Remus’s door. He almost ignored it in favor of continuing to dissect some unfortunate gummy bears, but a strange insistent feeling settled at the base of his neck. Fine. He’d go look.

When he slung the door open, Roman lay in a fallen heap. The panic set in after a second. Roman wasn’t moving. He wasn’t moving, and Remus wasn’t even sure he was breathing. What if he had broken bones - what if he was bleeding out - what if he was in a coma - _ what if he died here in the doorway - _

Pulling himself together (even if only slightly), he summoned some help.

“Remus, I swear -” Janus grumbled at the same time that Virgil demanded, “The fuck -?”

Remus didn’t turn to look where they had appeared somewhere behind him. He didn’t care where he had dragged them from. He couldn’t take his eyes off Roman.

“Get over here and _ help me.” _ His nerves must have shown in his voice or maybe they caught sight of Roman’s motionless body on the floor, because neither protested any further.

Virgil was quick to come up from behind him and kneel next to Roman, one hand pressed to his pulse point just under his jaw and his other hand wrapped around Roman’s wrist. His face was paler than normal when he turned back. “He’s alive.” He let go of Roman’s wrist to press the back of his hand to Roman’s forehead. “But it’s bad.”

Janus was hovering just over Remus’s shoulder. When he spoke, his voice was a grave whisper, like he was afraid to break the somber, suffocating silence that had settled over them. “What happened?”

“I don’t…” Remus shook his head, trying to swim above the rising tide of his thoughts. His expression darkened, and he bit out, “The Dragon Witch.”

**“Hey,”** Virgil cut in, refocusing them on the most pressing matter at hand. When he had their attention, he jerked his head, indicating they should come down to the floor with him. “JJ, you need to do something.” Virgil fixed Janus with a wide-eyed look, and the two had some kind of silent conversation that went over Remus’s head.

Janus sighed. “Alright. I’ll _ try.” _ He frowned down at Roman, and Virgil sat back so Janus could shift closer. “I don’t even know if this will work,” he murmured, glancing briefly up at Remus and Virgil.

Remus didn’t know what he looked like, but he knew he must have looked a mess. He felt nervous and lost and _ scared _ and it must have shown on his face because Janus gave him a pitying look that made his stomach turn.

Janus laid a hand on Roman’s forehead. He closed his eyes, and when he opened them again, both were yellow. His human eye had turned the same shade as his snake one, pupil elongated. “You are _ alright,” _ he said slowly, hauntingly, the words lingering in the air. “You are _ not _ injured, only ssssleeping. You are _ ssssafe _ and _ unharmed _ here. When you wake, _ nothing will hurt.” _

Pulling his hand away, Janus sat back on his feet for a moment before standing up. He brushed nonexistent dust off his cape. “That’s the best I can do,” he said crisply, tension in his shoulders. “I don’t even know if it did anything at all.”

Remus reached out and caught his arm. He made sure to hold Janus’s gaze, letting him feel the weight of his sincerity. “Thank you.”

Color bloomed in Janus's cheeks. “Enough of that,” he grumbled, pulling away from Remus.

“Sooo….” Virgil drew out the word, looking between Remus and Janus dryly, an eyebrow raised, but he didn’t say anything else about whatever had passed between them. “What are we gonna do now?”

Remus clenched his jaw without meaning to, nearly hard enough to break a tooth. He summoned his morning star and swung it up on his shoulder. “I’m going to kill the Dragon Witch.”

“Remus-”

“Try and stop me!” Remus snarled back at Virgil, daring him to say something else.

Virgil narrowed his eyes. _ “I meant _ what are we doing about _ him. _ We can’t just leave Creativity on the floor.” He pointed rather aggressively towards Roman’s still unconscious form.

Remus’s shoulders sagged slightly, and embarrassment bloomed in his chest at his outburst. Virgil was just trying to help, and he really _ was _ grateful for the help Janus and Virgil were both providing. The situation was… stressful.

“Okay look,” Virgil began, tone much gentler than it had been a moment before. (Remus hated it. He hated being pitied, he hated that the other two could read him so easily, but he couldn’t help but broadcast his emotions in technicolor. This was _ Roman _ who was laying near death on the floor.) “Go do what you have to, but take Janus. I can manage Princey here.”

“Are you sure?”

The edge of Virgil’s mouth quirked up in a tiny grin. “C’mon, what kind of protector would I be if I can’t look after one single Sleeping Beauty? I’ll be fine.”

Remus resisted the urge to do something stupid like hug him or cry. Instead he just nodded, not trusting himself to even attempt another ‘thank you.’

Janus took a step towards him. “Ready?”

He shifted his morning star off his shoulder. “Do you have a weapon?”

“I’m not unarmed,” Janus riposted, grinning slyly.

Remus had no idea what exactly that meant, but he wasn’t in the mood to care. He held up his fingers, and after Janus nodded, he snapped. They disappeared from the hallway just outside Remus’s room and found themselves in the Imagination.

*

Roman blinked his eyes, yawning. For a moment, he was lost in the warmth and confusion of a mind half asleep, but reality soon kicked in to firmly wake him. His heart skipped a beat when he realized he was decidedly not in his own room. And he wasn’t reassured any when he saw that he was, in fact, in Remus’s room. Movement from somewhere in his peripheral vision gave him a jump scare, and adrenaline flooded his heart when he didn’t recognize the person staring back at him. 

It was a dark side.

He sat up in Remus’s bed and jerked away, falling rather ungracefully to the floor. But he was on his feet in a moment, katana summoned and raised in his hand.

One moment he was starting to swing his katana and the next, he was holding nothing. It took him a moment to process that he had been disarmed. He found himself shoved backwards, back pressed against a wall, caged in by a hand next to his head and an arm across his throat. The dark side had his face scarily close to Roman’s own, close enough that Roman could see distinct rings of dark circles under his eyes and what looked like - fangs?

The other side blinked and widened his eyes, looking faintly surprised. Just as quickly as he had been pinned, Roman was let go. The other side withdrew, taking two steps back and hunching his shoulders, a grimace twisting at the edge of his mouth. “Don’t do that.”

Roman’s mouth fell open. “I - _ me _ \- you! Don’t _ you _ do that!” He held out his hand, and his katana disappeared from where it was laying on the floor several feet away and reappeared in his hand.

The other side shrunk back further. “I didn’t mean to,” he hissed, and Roman got a roundabout impression that he was worried, but somehow, not for himself. And that really only left Roman for him to be worried about. But Roman was the one with a weapon. 

_ Curiouser and curiouser. _

Roman narrowed his eyes slightly, then decided to create a sheath at his waist. He tucked his katana away as a gesture of goodwill (despite the fact that they both knew he could simply summon it into his hands again). “Who are you?” But before the other side could say anything, Roman suddenly remembered why he was there at all in the first place.

“THE DRAGON WITCH!” Roman exploded, too riled up to notice the way the dark side winced at his volume. “What am _ I _ doing here?!” He spun in a circle, patting his arms and legs and stomach and anywhere else he could reach, vainly looking for injuries. “I was - I didn’t - I should be-”

The dark side rapidly came into his field of vision, and Roman made himself stand still. The side had his hands reached out, as if he were going to touch Roman’s shoulders, but at the last second he dropped them back to his sides, like a puppet with its strings cut.

“You were injured,” the side said softly and slowly, and Roman wanted to demand the full story immediately. He had no need to be treated like some fragile, crystalline glass. “Remus found you.”

Roman blinked, remembering that he had willed himself from the Imagination to Remus’s door in a desperate last ditch effort of self-preservation. “Oh. I did. I did that.” He closed his eyes for a long moment.

He should be injured. He should be hurt. But Remus - Remus must have helped him - somehow. Or maybe one of the other dark sides had.

He didn’t know what to think.

Hysterical laughter was slowly filling up his chest, but he refused to let it out.

_ You’re losing it. _

He took a deep breath and held it for a moment.

“…Creativity?” the side prompted him, concern coloring his voice.

Roman opened his eyes, grounding himself, and asked, “Where is he?”

The dark side’s face scrunched up. “Huh?”

“My brother. Remus. Creativity. The Duke.” Roman could hear himself getting louder and sharper but he couldn’t seem to stop. “I don’t know what you call him, but I need to know where he is!”

The side gestured for him to sit down on Remus’s bed. Roman sat, but only because he didn’t want to waste the time or the effort to argue about it. He tapped his thumbs together impatiently.

“He went after the Dragon Witch. With Deceit.”

Roman was back on his feet in a heartbeat. “He WHAT?!”

“He - ugh why did I volunteer for this?” the side groaned, and if Roman wasn’t mistaken, the eyeshadow under his eyes was getting darker. “Just chill out and sit down and wait for them to get back. They’ll be fine.”

“I can’t just - ”

**“Sit down.”**

Roman sat, shuddering slightly. _“Loki’s helm,”_ he swore, watching the side pinch the bridge of his nose, looking miserable. “What was _ that?” _

The side fidgeted nervously, shifting his weight back and forth, seemingly unable to stay still. “Look, Princey…”

Roman mouthed the nickname, an eyebrow arched. He was ignored.

“Can you just wait for Remus? I’m _ so _ not equipped to handle…” He made a sweeping motion in Roman’s general direction.

They lapsed into silence.

Roman hesitantly kicked his feet, knocking them against the side of the bed. His fingers tangled in his sash. “What if something happens to him?”

“He’ll be fine. He _has_ to be fine.” That wasn’t particularly reassuring. Worry spiked in Roman’s heart, and it must have shown on his face, because the other side sighed and placated, “The only thing Remus _ can’t _ handle is polite conversation.”

“But -”

“And he’s got Deceit with him.”

Roman looked up, and the other side gave him a lopsided attempt at a grin that seemed like it was meant to be reassuring. He looked away and mumbled, “Thanks.”

He shifted, pulling his legs up underneath him on the mattress. Trying his best not to think of the Dragon Witch fatally wounding anyone, he summoned a rubber band to fidget with.

<strike>If</strike> _when_ Remus made it back, he was going to kill him.

He was torn between being incredibly touched that Remus would go after his archenemy for him and incredibly angry that Remus would risk his safety so carelessly, and both thoughts made him feel things that he would rather not be feeling. Complicated emotions were never his forte.

_Mother of Frigga, what was taking Remus so long?!_

The other side took little steps forwards, hesitantly sitting on the bed a fair distance away. When Roman looked over at him, he was watching him carefully.

Roman tried his best to look nonthreatening and welcoming (because after all this wasn’t his room - it wasn’t even his half of the Mindscape), but with his mind being preoccupied as it was, he was afraid his expression was more of a scowl than anything else.

The other side cleared his throat. “I’m… Anxiety.”

The way he said it confused Roman. It was less of an invitation to call him who he was and more like a begrudging duty, that he offered up this piece of identity. Regardless, Roman returned the title with his name. “I’m Roman.”

“I know,” Anxiety snapped back a bit too quickly, a bitter undercurrent in his voice. Roman had no idea why. But before he could fully form any question, Remus and Deceit blinked into existence. They appeared in the center of the room, to Anxiety’s left. Anxiety darted over to them, poking their sides and spinning them in circles.

Roman stood up from the bed, edging closer, looking for any sign that the Dragon Witch had hurt them. He couldn’t help but breathe a little easier when he couldn’t find anything wrong with Remus (besides the usual).

Remus batted Anxiety’s hands away. “I’m fine,” he protested, and Anxiety gave up looking at him, devoting all of his attention to a faintly amused Deceit.

Crossing his arms, Roman gave Remus a stern look. “Count Dread over there says you went after the Dragon Witch.”

Remus crossed his arms right back. “It was about time someone did something about that menace.”

“The Dragon Witch was in my half of the Imagination!”

“Well excuse me for saving your half! I know how much you like to play hero, but I guess it was my turn!”

“It was fine! I had it under control!”

“You’ve been showing up here half dead for weeks!” The raw emotion in Remus’s voice caused Deceit and Anxiety to freeze and stop their murmured discussion. They glanced between the brothers, equal parts intrigued and embarrassed for intruding on a private moment. Roman simply stared. When he finally opened his mouth to say something, Remus bit out, _ “Don’t. _ Leave it alone.”

Remus turned to the others, demanding sharply, “What are you still doing here? Crisis averted. Pack it up, show’s almost over boys.”

“Thank god,” Anxiety grumbled, disappearing immediately.

Deceit rolled his eyes. “You owe us.” When Remus didn’t say anything, he raised an expectant eyebrow. “I collect on debts owed,” he warned, before turning and stalking out the door.

“Drama queen!” Remus called after him, laughing when Deceit did not stop or turn around but held up a hand and flipped him off.

When Deceit’s footsteps no longer echoed in the hallway, Remus’s attention finally fell back to him.

“Remus…” He wanted to apologize and express his gratitude and ask forgiveness and demand an explanation and squeeze the life out of him (because really what he wanted most was to hug him). But too much of the emotion he felt crashing around inside him must have leaked out. Roman’s voice was soft, too soft it seemed, because Remus flinched, looking ready to disappear at any second, eyes wide in a sort of panic Roman instantly recognized and found hard to explain.

“Tell me,” Roman course-corrected quickly, knowing that Remus couldn’t accept any kind of sentimental mush. “Did you find the Dragon Witch?”

Remus broke into a slightly manic grin. “Deceit talked me out of murder but look,” he raised a hand and was suddenly holding up a toy bug catcher.

Roman stepped closer to peer inside, surprised to see a tiny lizard. He looked back up at Remus.

“Deceit talked me in to a factory reset of sorts.” Remus pushed the bug catcher into Roman’s hands. “Don’t let the Dragon Witch grow so big and fearsome this time, huh?” He pushed Roman towards the door. “There’s no use being Creativity if you can’t control what you create. Not very princely, now is it?”

There was enough residual love and goodwill left over from everything that had happened that Roman magnanimously decided to ignore the barbs. He grinned back at Remus, a touch hysterical around the edges, somehow bubbling over with emotion for reasons he couldn’t explain. “Thanks.”

Remus’s expression mellowed and gentled, and Roman felt a bit like a balloon that had just had a pin stuck in it.

“Remus…” There were a million things he wanted to say, but a million and one reasons he couldn’t - wouldn’t - _didn’t_ say them. He raised up the cage with the now tiny Dragon Witch inside, adding a half-hearted, hopeless, “Thank you,” to the gesture.

Remus’s eyes widened a bit, and he quickly bit out, “Wear the damn armor I gave you.”

“I owe you one,” Roman vowed, all seriousness.

Remus held up a hand, clearly showing Roman he was about to snap and send him away. Melancholy colored his expression. “Don’t come back, and I’ll call us even.”

He snapped.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick note: Rest assured that Roman knows when Remus says, "Don't come back," he means, "Don't come back _injured_."
> 
> All is well. Er... as well as can be between them. You know how siblings are.
> 
> This fic did not touch any of the prejudices or imposed boundaries of "light" and "dark" sides, so I tried not to write too many Sappy Moments™. If one person was having feelings, I tried to make the other shy away so we could still get that lovely awkward angsty I-can't-express-positive-emotions-for-you-because-we're-on-opposite-sides vibes. I try my best to balance my need for soft fluffiness with the character's personalities and a plausible plot. But yeah I hope y'all liked this! <3
> 
> If you have any prompts/requests please feel free to send them my way @[doctor-gloom](https://doctor-gloom.tumblr.com) on tumblr :D


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter in particular is dedicated to @Piqued_Penguin, who mentioned it would be neat to see the tables turn and Remus hurt and Roman take care of him and I thought to myself, "now there's a galaxy brain idea"

A loud noise jolted Roman awake. Someone was knocking on his bedroom door. His body begged him to stay underneath his comforter, where he was warm and sleepy and soft, but his mind made him get up and walk to the door. He was still half asleep when he opened it, but the sight that greeted him washed away any lingering drowsiness.

It was Remus.

His brother stumbled past him into the room, stopping in the middle and simply standing there, still and quiet.

Remus was never still and quiet.

Roman shut his eyes and rubbed them. He closed the door and turned on the lights. “Remus?”

Remus turned to look at him, chewing on his bottom lip. His hands were pressed against his ribs. “I wouldn’t’ve come but Anxiety almost died last time I went to him because he was freaking out and I think seeing blood is bad for him and I would’ve gone to Deceit but he told me to never go to him again but he was kidding and I know he was kidding but I really messed up this time and I don’t want him to watch me–”

“…Blood?” Roman cut off Remus’s ramblings, having picked up on that word in particular. An uneasy feeling bloomed in his stomach and crawled up his throat. “Are you hurt?”

Slowly, so slowly, Remus pulled his hands away from his side, revealing his palms. Blood coated his skin, dripping from his fingers, and it was likely on his jacket as well, not that Roman could see it on the black fabric.

Roman’s breath caught in his throat, choking him. He reached for Remus, needing to do something, but then pulled his arms down at his sides, hands closed into fists as he drew in a deep breath and forced himself to stay calm. He tried to speak but found he couldn’t. Cleared his throat. Tried again. “Lay down.”

“I think…” Remus’s eyes were filled with tears. “I think I really messed up this time.”

Roman felt his heart rate accelerate and fought down tears of his own. He was panicking but he knew panic wouldn’t help them fix anything right now. Taking a measured breath, Roman kept his voice level by some miracle. “It’s gonna be okay.” Gently, he nudged Remus towards his bed, holding one of his arms and helping him swing his legs up once he was sitting. Remus moved like a glacier, slowly, and let out a few winces and whimpers as he laid down.

“I’m going to take your jacket off,” Roman told Remus softly, not sure if he was still listening with his eyes screwed shut, breathing heavy. With shaking fingers, Roman undid the first button before remembering he didn’t have to do it the hard way. He snapped his fingers and Remus’s jacket was gone, leaving him in the green t-shirt that he had on underneath.

Roman couldn’t help but gasp when he saw the bloodstain on Remus’s side, blossoming like a sickly rose.

_There’s so much blood._

Remus tried to grab at him, and Roman caught his unsteady hand with his own. “I’m here,” he murmured, realizing the blood loss was starting to get to Remus. He looked pale, and Remus’s eyes didn’t seem to be able to focus on Roman’s face.

Hysteria curled tight around his lungs. This was bad. _Really_ bad. There was blood on Remus’s side and blood on Remus’s hands and blood on Roman’s own hands and blood on the sheets and _how could someone lose that much blood?_

A single thought echoed in Roman’s head, made stronger by the overwhelming fear flooding his veins. _Remus is going to die._

“…Kiddo?”

Without letting go of Remus’s hand, Roman turned towards the door. If he wasn’t currently _losing his mind,_ he would have been surprised to see Patton. Instead, all he could do was blink and say, “Huh?”

Patton took a few steps closer, looking between Remus and Roman with growing concern. In a soft, careful voice, Patton said, “I felt… Roman, you’re _crying.”_

_Oh. _Roman reached up to feel tears on his cheeks. He opened his mouth and didn’t have any words to say.

Patton gasped at something over Roman’s shoulder, and when Roman turned to see what he was looking at, he found Anxiety.

There were dark circles under Anxiety’s eyes, and he looked afraid. The hood of his jacket was pulled up over his face, casting him in shadows. **“Stop it.”**

Roman flinched, and Anxiety looked away for a second, pained. With noticeable effort, he swallowed and said, “You’re going to give Thomas a panic attack.” He raised a hand, slowly, clearly showing Roman what he was doing, and placed it on Roman’s shoulder. Some of Roman’s panic vanished. Not all, but some.

Anxiety jerked back, pulling his hand away. He pushed Roman aside, crowding close to Remus. **“Fuck.”**

Roman felt Patton come up behind him and turned just in time to catch Patton in a dead faint.

**“DECEIT!”**

Deceit appeared. He took one look at all of them and grabbed Anxiety’s shoulders, walking him over to a corner, and made him sit down. He crouched down and whispered things that Roman couldn’t hear. Then, leaving Anxiety curled up in a ball, buried somewhere inside his jacket, Deceit walked over to Roman’s side, inspecting Remus.

“Shit, this is bad,” Deceit swore under his breath, reaching out a hand, as if to touch Remus, before pulling away. He turned to look at Roman with undisguised fear splashed across his face. “Summon Logic.”

Roman blinked uncomprehendingly. _Remus is dying._

Deceit hissed out a breath and demanded, “Logic!”

Logan rose up on Roman’s other side, looking confused until he saw the body in the bed and the body on the floor.

Roman’s brain restarted and he quickly informed Logan, “Patton fainted. He’s okay. But Remus…” He sniffled, wiping at his cheeks. “It’s bad, Lo.”

Logan brushed past Roman, already lifting the edge of Remus’s shirt, carefully peeling the bloodied fabric from Remus’s skin. Remus made no noises and no movements, most likely… most likely _unconscious._ Remus was only unconscious. He had to be. The alternative was too much to bear. His brother _had_ to be okay. Because if Remus wasn’t okay, if anything happened to him now… Roman would never be okay again.

With stinging eyes, he choked back a sob. A voice in the back of his mind screamed, _Remus is dying and all you can do is stand here crying!_

_I don’t know how to do anything else,_ he answered back miserably.

“Could you…?” Logan asked, and it took Roman a minute to realize Logan wasn’t speaking to him but to Deceit.

Deceit laid a steady hand on Roman’s shoulder, gently pushing him away. He led him over to Anxiety, sitting Roman down before whispering to Anxiety, loud enough that Roman heard, “Help him.”

Anxiety didn’t look like he was in any shape to be helping anyone, but he carefully inched towards Roman and cautiously held out his arms. Without a second thought to Anxiety being a dark side, Roman wrapped his arms around Anxiety, nearly crawling into his lap, trying to press as close as he could. Maybe, if he tried hard enough, everything else would cease to exist and he would be left with only the sound of the heartbeat coming from Anxiety’s chest.

“You gotta breathe me with,” Anxiety said in a low voice, emotion catching some of his words.

Roman tried to make his lungs work in time with the rise and fall of Anxiety’s chest. He could feel Anxiety’s shirt grow wet against his cheeks and didn’t have it in him to be embarrassed that he was crying so much. “He has to be okay. He _has_ to. He has – if he – I can’t, if he – I –"

When he tried to pull back, Anxiety held him in place. "I know," he soothed. "I know." He moved one of his hands to cradle the back of Roman's head. "Deceit and Logic will do _everything_ they can for him. But you gotta stay here with me and wait.”

“He’s my brother,” Roman whispered, grabbing handfuls of Anxiety’s jacket where his arms were wrapped around the other side. “I can’t lose him – _he’s my brother.”_

Anxiety hugged him a little tighter. He rested his cheek against the top of Roman’s head. “I know,” he admitted softly, “He’s my best friend.”

*

When Roman woke the next morning, there was a pillow beneath his head. He was lying on the floor. Anxiety was curled up next to him, not touching him, but his hand laid in the space between them, almost as if he was reaching out to Roman in his sleep. There was a pillow under his head too. Patton was still on the floor, although he had a pillow and blanket and a frog stuffed animal with him. Deceit was sitting on the floor, leaning back against the bed, his hat tilted down over his face, snoring. The chair from Roman’s desk had been moved next to the bed, and Logan was sitting in it, reading a book. He looked exhausted.

Roman sat up. “Logan?”

Logan looked up and caught Roman’s gaze.

“Remus? Is he…?”

Logan looked over at the figure on the bed. “He is asleep but should recover with time.”

“Okay.” Roman nodded, feeling like he wanted to laugh only to suddenly realize that he was crying. Logan set his book down, already starting to stand, concern creasing between his eyebrows, but Roman shook his head. “I’m okay.” He sucked in a breath. “I’m relieved,” he explained.

Logan frowned but settled back in is chair. “You should get some more rest.”

Roman looked back at the bed, just barely able to see Remus there. He laid back down, feeling like he had been underwater for a long time and he could finally breathe again.

He conjured a blanket over Anxiety and drifted back to sleep.

*

Later that morning, Roman could hear Patton’s snores before he even opened his eyes. He was surprised to see Anxiety wasn’t beside him on the floor anymore. Logan had fallen asleep, his head leaning back on the wall behind him, still sitting in the chair. Deceit was nowhere to be found.

Roman’s heart skipped a beat as he stood up, disappointment crashing over him as he realized his bed was empty.

The three dark sides were gone.

There was something black and square on the bed, and Roman picked it up. It was paper. He turned it over, finding nothing on one side and on the other, written in beautiful looping gold letters, three words: _We owe you._

*

Every day for a week, Roman went to Remus’s door and knocked. Every day for a week, there was no response. He even went so far as to sit out in the hallway outside Remus’s room for five hours on the fourth day, but he never saw trace of Remus nor Deceit nor Anxiety.

He wouldn’t admit it, least of all to himself, but he was scared.

Finally, on the eighth day, there was a muffled response from inside Remus’s room when Roman knocked. He took the noise he heard to mean he was to come in and opened the door. Remus was lying in bed, looking pale and tired and a bit ill, but awake and _alive._ Roman had to force back a wave of emotion, worried for a fleeting moment that he might start crying.

Remus’s expression flicked from surprise to a tired smile, gone again before Roman could blink.

Roman came to sit on the edge of Remus’s bed, careful not to jostle him. “Hey.”

The edge of Remus’s mouth quirked up. “Hey.”

They sat in a silence for a few minutes. Roman catalogued everything he could see – the circles under Remus’s eyes (the ones from getting little sleep, not the ones from Remus’s horrible taste in eyeshadow shades), the way his cheeks looked sunken in, the bruises that had appeared since that night, the bandages around his bare torso. Roman kept getting caught on the mischievous spark in Remus’s eyes, the playfulness in the tilt of his lips. He had almost lost his brother. That terrifying reality made Roman wish for a sketchbook so he could commit Remus’s likeness to more than just his memory.

There was a patchwork blanket next to Remus, laid out in a way that suggested someone had been sleeping on the other side of him. Roman thought he could guess who it was.

“Deceit says I’ll live,” Remus eventually offered into the silence. He never much liked the quiet; it was too boring for him. “He’s been forcing me to drink water and eat soup ever since he deemed I was stable enough for it. The bastard. You wouldn’t believe how many times an hour I have to pee.”

It startled a laugh out of him, because that was Remus. Only Remus could describe being taken care of in such a way, as if he was enduring torture instead of being nursed back to health.

Once he stopped laughing, Roman found he had tears in his eyes, and they weren’t happy ones. He roughly wiped them away. “I thought –” He couldn’t hold Remus’s gaze, so he dropped his eyes to the bed beneath them. Words bubbled up from wherever he had tried to bottle them away and suddenly Roman found himself pouring his heart out. “I thought you were gonna die and there was so much blood and I didn’t know what to do and I was so _scared–”_

“I know,” Remus cut him off, not unkindly. “But I’m okay.”

Roman reached out and grabbed his hand, eternally grateful when Remus didn’t say anything about it. “Yeah. You’re okay.”

Remus winced, making Roman fret over him. “What? Are you okay? What is it?”

“I’m fine,” Remus waved him off. “Been sitting up too long.”

Roman helped him lay back down, even going so far as to pull the sheets up around him. Remus just shoved them back down. The thick white bandages around Remus’s ribs caught Roman’s attention. He didn’t say anything about them and Remus didn’t either. Remembering a bloodstained shirt, Roman couldn’t stop looking at how pristine and unblemished the bandages were.

He didn’t take Remus’s hand again.

“I heard,” Remus started with a smirk and a teasing tone, “that _you_ were entirely useless. Here I was, stitching you up on this very bed, and you couldn’t return the favor. For shame.”

Roman knew he was joking, but he still felt guilt gnaw at his stomach. But mercifully, he was saved from answering. A laughing voice came from the hallway, “JJ says he’s coming with _yet another_ _–”_ When Anxiety crossed through the doorway and caught sight of Roman, he abruptly stopped speaking. The humor faded from his expression, and he shoved his hands into his jacket pockets, watching Roman warily.

Roman couldn’t help but wonder where the protective and comforting Anxiety from the night his world fell apart had gone. This Anxiety was skittish and leery of him, eyeing him in a way that made Roman think Anxiety didn’t actually like him very much at all, despite the fact that they barely knew each other.

“My brother came to visit,” Remus explained.

“I see.”

The three were locked in a tense silence. Just as Roman thought he couldn’t stand it anymore, Anxiety blurted out, “I was just – but I’ll leave – later, I can – I’ll be back later –”

“No,” Roman waved his concerns away, not missing the way Anxiety took a step back when he stood up from the bed. “No, you can stay. Please don’t leave on my account.” He looked down at Remus. “I was just going anyway.”

An emotion he couldn’t name crossed Remus’s face. He felt his heart constrict.

“Really, I don’t –”

Roman shook his head, turning back to Anxiety. “This is your half. I only wanted –” His voice caught, and he started again. “I only wanted to make sure that Remus was okay.”

“Get over here,” Remus demanded, speaking to Anxiety.

As Roman walked to the door and Anxiety walked towards the bed, Roman noticed Anxiety circled away from him when they got close, turning so his back wasn’t to Roman, so he could still see him. Roman suddenly wanted to say something but couldn’t think of what it might be. At the doorway, he turned and watched as Anxiety carefully settled himself next to Remus.

“Goodbye, Remus,” Roman said, feeling like this was final somehow. As if he might never see his brother again. _Ridiculous._

“Bro,” Remus acknowledged with a funny tilt of his head.

“Anxiety?” The side in question looked at him and narrowed his eyes, and Roman took that as the sign to continue speaking. “…Thank you.”

Eyes wide, Anxiety turned to Remus who said something too quiet for Roman to hear.

He left the room, pausing outside the doorway, hesitating for a moment before taking a left, the opposite of the direction towards the light side. He summoned the note that had been left on his bed, the black piece of paper. With a little bit of concentration, he added his own words underneath the ones already there: _It is I who owes you._ On the opposite side, he turned the paper red and added simply, _Thank you._

At the end of the hallway, he found a living room and a kitchen, a mirror to the layout on the light half. Deceit was standing at the stove, stirring something in a pot. On the counter was a tray with a cup full of water and another cup full of crushed ice. Roman thought he smelled soup cooking and smiled, thinking of how Remus had complained earlier about being given fluids.

He cleared his throat, wincing when Deceit startled. “This is for you,” he said promptly, no preamble. He set the piece of paper on the counter.

Deceit was looking at him with confusion and a sharp curiosity that made Roman’s insides squirm.

“I was checking on Remus,” Roman explained before Deceit could ask. “Thank you for taking care of him.” Then he sunk out.

*

“This is such a bad idea,” Roman murmured, touching the hilt of his katana in a self-comforting gesture.

“This was _your_ idea,” Logan deadpanned, looking over his shoulder at where Roman and Patton trailed behind him.

“Which you agreed to!” Roman riposted, “You’re supposed to be the voice of reason! You’re not supposed to give in to my harebrained schemes!”

Logan’s response was immediate. “So you admit they are harebrained?”

Roman started to protest but Patton spoke over him. “Well I think this was a _great_ idea!”

Logan abruptly stopped walking, causing Roman to run into him and then Patton to run into Roman.

“What is it?” Roman whispered, feeling his heart start to race with adrenaline.

“If Patton thinks this is a great idea,” Logan said slowly, “Then perhaps we should abandon this venture.”

“Hey!” Patton pouted, while Logan offered him a smile.

“I am merely making a joke. It was meant to establish friendly rapport.”

“But…” Roman frowned. “All of us are already friends?”

Logan started walking again. “I was under the assumption friends engage in banter even after initially getting to know one another. Please correct me if this is untrue.”

Roman looked back at Patton, whispering, “I can never tell if he’s serious or making fun of me.”

Finally reaching their destination, Logan stopped in front of a door, readjusting his already perfectly neat tie. “I’m always serious,” he scoffed. His gaze flicked to Patton, and he winked, making the other side giggle.

Roman leaned forward and knocked on the door before he could lose his courage and change his mind.

There was silence and then frantic whispers and then silence again. Eventually, the door was slowly pulled open, revealing two figures in the doorway. Deceit was frowning and looking at them through narrowed eyes, while Anxiety had his arms crossed, looking between the three of them as if he suspected them of murder.

“No fair!” A voice from further in the room whined. “Let them in! I want to see!” When no one immediately moved, Remus continued, “Don’t make me get out of bed, because I will! You know I will!”

Anxiety spun on his heel and was across the room in half a second. “Don’t you dare,” he warned Remus.

Deceit looked up at the ceiling and gave a long-suffering sigh. After a moment, he seemed to pull himself together. “Please,” he said, suddenly grinning in a way that was clearly meant to be unsettling, “Won’t you come in?” He stepped out of their way, holding the door open.

Logan immediately walked in, followed closely by Patton and Roman himself. Anxiety was sitting on the very edge of Remus’s bed, up at the top, next to Remus. He looked tense. Remus looked thrilled.

Apparently done with the pleasantries, Anxiety demanded, “What do you want?”

“We just wanted to check up on Roman’s brother… Remus?” Patton looked between Roman and Remus, sounding hesitant at his first time addressing Remus by name.

“Oh,” Roman hit his head with his palm. “I guess I could make introductions since I know everyone.” Anxiety and Deceit both stiffened, but Roman kept going. “I’m Roman, the other half of Creativity. This,” he gestured to Patton, “is Morality.”

“You can call me Patton!” The side in question interjected with a bright grin.

“This,” Roman gestured to Logan this time, “is Logic.” Logan offered the others a tight smile and Roman tried not to laugh at how forced it looked. “You all know my brother, the other Creativity. And …Anxiety?” Roman gestured to Anxiety, who looked like he would rather crawl under the bed, but nodded in confirmation of his identity. “And …Deceit?” Deceit grinned, just enough to show them his fangs.

Patton gasped and softly murmured, “Pointy.”

Remus and Roman both stifled giggles, which grew to be an impossible feat when Deceit’s face scrunched up in confusion.

“So…” Anxiety cleared his throat. “Are we good now?” When no one immediately answered, he continued, “You came. You saw. You could go now.”

“How rude!” Remus chided, making Anxiety roll his eyes. “This is my party! If you don’t like it, you can leave.”

“Don’t tempt me.”

“Actually,” Logan spoke up, looking at Roman and Patton somewhat sheepishly. “I have an additional reason for being here, beyond checking on the wellbeing of …Remus.”

Roman hit Logan’s shoulder (but gently, he didn’t actually want to hurt him). “Where’s the trust?”

“Roman…” Patton scolded him, “Violence is never the answer.”

Deceit tilted his head curiously. “Well actually –”

The room dropped into silence when Logan pulled something from his pocket. He held up a small square of black paper that was eerily familiar to Roman.

“How’d you get that?”

Logan raised his eyebrows. “Deceit gave this to me after we stabilized Remus.”

Roman’s gaze slid to Deceit, who looked like he had swallowed a lemon. “You’re big on debts, aren’t you?”

Deceit didn’t laugh. He didn’t say anything at all.

Anxiety stood up from the bed, and Roman was acutely aware that he stepped forward, slightly in front of Deceit. “What do you _want?”_

“My apologies. This is not transpiring quite as I imagined it would.” Logan held out the paper to Deceit, but it was Anxiety who took it and handed it to the side behind him. “There is no payment needed for our aid in helping with Remus’s injuries. Remus is a part of Thomas and it would be idiotic to neglect the wellbeing of any side when we are capable of offering assistance. However, judging by the note, you perceive a debt exists now, regardless that this is unnecessary. In which case, I would like to ask that the three of you join us for a meal, perhaps dinner, sometime in the near future.”

Anxiety opened his mouth and blinked and then made a confused noise. Deceit, who had been running a gloved finger along the edge of the note while Logan was speaking, asked shrewdly, “Why?”

Logan’s face pinched, as if he found the question ridiculous. “I would like to observe you to better understand what function you provide Thomas.” His voice held a certain pointedness, suggesting that he thought what he was saying should be obvious.

The eyeshadow under Anxiety’s eyes got suspiciously darker, and Remus looked like he was considering doing something that Roman could already tell was a bad idea. “What he means to say,” he quickly added, in an attempt to smooth things over and explain Logan-speak for the others, “Is that he would like to get to know you.”

“That’s what I said.”

Roman shook his head. “That’s not what you said.”

“What? Yes it was. Patton.” Logan leaned forward, looking around Roman to make eye contact with Patton. “Please tell Roman he is mistaken.”

“Well kiddo… I think he’s right on this one.”

Logan turned to look at Deceit, Anxiety, and Remus, arching an eyebrow, as if to say, _Can you believe what I put up with?_

Remus kept looking back and forth between Roman, Logan, and Patton with an ever-growing smile.

“Now that we’ve settled nothing,” Logan said dryly, “When would be a convenient time for you?”

Deceit looked startled. “We haven’t accepted.”

“But we will!” Remus quickly added.

Anxiety looked up at the ceiling. “Just kill me.”

“I don’t understand,” Logan said, beginning to sound slightly frustrated. “We have all experienced a shared event. It makes sense to now begin the process of becoming familiar with one another so that we can better work to help Thomas collectively rather than separately.”

Roman wasn’t sure what to make of that. _Has he been waiting for a ‘shared event’ to happen?_

“Providing better assistance to Thomas is, obviously, reason enough. However, I believe there will be benefits to yourselves as well. I myself do not experience emotions and therefore do not require such things –”

“ – You are aware I can tell when we lie, right? – ”

“ – but I have been told by Patton that social interaction inspires feelings of happiness and contentedness.”

Anxiety held up a hand then pointed to himself. “I’m _literally_ Anxiety.”

“You can expect us tomorrow evening.” Both Anxiety and Deceit turned to look at Remus with twin looks of doubt.

“Excellent,” Logan said with no enthusiasm, making Roman smile. Logan was an awkward pain in the ass, but he was _Roman’s_ (well, technically Thomas’s, but semantics) pain in the ass, and Roman wouldn’t trade him for anything.

Remus shifted in bed, and Roman couldn’t help but notice he still looked like it hurt when he moved. He caught Patton’s eye and said, “Why don’t you two head back and I’ll catch up with you.” Logan started to protest, but thankfully Patton understood Roman’s look and cajoled Logan into leaving.

Anxiety glared at Remus and then declared to the room at large, “I’ll just be in my room, alone, mentally preparing until we leave tomorrow. If you need me… don’t.” Then he disappeared.

Deceit looked between the two brothers and then down at the note Logan had returned. He pressed his lips together and silently walked out of the room.

“Cheerful, aren’t they?”

Roman ignored Remus’s quip, instead addressing the glaringly obvious. “Are you sure you should’ve accepted for them? If they don’t want to go, you can come on your own.”

Remus laughed. “Nah, they’ll show up.” At Roman’s unimpressed expression, Remus explained, “Sure they’ll act like they’re being dragged to it, but the truth is, they wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

He hummed in general agreement, letting the matter go. After all, he didn’t know the sides; Remus did. Although maybe that would be changing in the future (especially, it seemed, if Logan had anything to do with it). “How are you healing up?”

“Eh.” Remus shrugged a shoulder, although the gesture was somewhat lost as he was currently laying down. “I wanted to keep the scar so it’s taking longer. But it’s gonna be so worth it, just you wait.”

Internally, Roman was screaming and pulling his hair and begging Remus to let himself be taken care of for once, _just once,_ in his life because _do you know what I went through when you were lying in my bed** bleeding out?!**_ Externally, Roman managed to get out a strangled, “Mhm.”

“I’ll show you the scar when it’s all healed up. Right now, you might pass out like that other side did if you saw what it looked like.”

“Patton,” Roman corrected him. “What happened to you anyway? You never got around to telling me.”

Remus’s expression immediately brightened. “It’s some of my best work yet. So basically the thought that started it was, ‘What if unicorns were natural predators?’ And then Thomas rewatched Jurassic Park so I thought…”

Roman listened to his brother explain what sounded more or less like Mary Shelley’s _Frankenstein_, or at least the first half of it. While nodding along and making noises every so often to show he was listening, he mentally made a note to find the thing in Remus’s half of the Imagination and cage it or kill it or do _something_ before Remus got hurt. _Again._

After a while, Remus’s story devolved into a different story altogether, and then he was just recounting his favorite adventures in the Imagination. Somehow, Roman didn’t mind. But sometime after the story about the giant potato car, Remus started yawning, visually becoming more tired by the second.

“Hey,” Roman gently interrupted, “I’m gonna let you get some rest.”

“I’m not tired,” Remus protested, already pulling at the sheets on his bed.

“I have things I have to do anyway.” For the millionth time, Roman’s gaze focused on Remus’s bandages. His chest squeezed unpleasantly. Without consulting his head at all, his mouth said, “You’re not allowed to do something like that again. No more near death experiences. No injuries. No showing up at my door while flirting with death.”

Remus grumbled something that sounded suspiciously like, “Now you know how I felt.”

“Goodbye Remus,” Roman said firmly, ignoring the recurring feelings he had been ignoring ever since Remus showed up half dead.

Remus’s eyes shot open. His voice sounded hesitant, but perhaps he was just sleepy. Or perhaps Roman was reading into things too much. “See you tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow,” Roman confirmed, unable to stop a small, fond smile.

If there was something like hope lingering in the air, in their eyes, in their hearts, neither brother mentioned it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really enjoyed writing this, and I hope y'all liked it!
> 
> If you have any prompts/requests please feel free to send them my way [@doctor-gloom](https://doctor-gloom.tumblr.com/) on tumblr :D


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